


Endgame

by eternaleponine



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-05
Updated: 2012-10-05
Packaged: 2017-11-15 16:13:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/529119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eternaleponine/pseuds/eternaleponine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hawkeye and Black Widow are sent on a mission.  Things don't go entirely according to plan.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Endgame

"Hawkeye. Tell me you've got visual." _Lie to me if you have to_ , but she didn't really mean that. Her lungs burned from breathing in the caustic fog their targets had used to obscure their position when they'd realized they were under attack. It worked, because Black Widow couldn't see a damn thing. Her only hope was that her partner, from his perch, was above it all and had been able to maintain a line of sight.

"Affirmative," he said, his voice calm and assured. Little could shake him, especially when he had his bow and the high ground. "Stand by."

As if she had a choice. Her body thrummed with tension, every nerve alight as she waited for some word from her eyes in the sky. She trusted him to keep her safe, trusted him with her life, but it didn't stop her adrenaline-primed senses from twitching at every little sound and shift in the light.

"I've got him," Clint breathed, and then a second later she heard a yelp that cut off into a gurgle. "Target terminated."

"Are there any stragglers?"

"No... wait." There was a catch in his voice that turned her insides to ice. "Four o'clock." She turned, gun out, finger on the trigger, but the threat wasn't human. She heard the beep just before the shout in her ear: "Natasha, RUN!"

She ran, and had only just cleared the door when whatever Clint had seen, whatever she had heard, detonated, taking down the warehouse that had been their target's base of operations.

She ducked and covered, sheltering her head with her arms until chunks of concrete stopped raining down. Her ears were ringing from the blast and she felt bruised all over from the shower of debris she had been unable to avoid. She stood up, brushed herself off, looked around.

Realization dawned slowly, too slowly, that Clint had been in the building when it blew. There was no way he had gotten out. The only hope she had was that he'd been up high, so there wouldn't have been that much to fall on top of him. Unless whatever he'd been using as a perch had fallen first...

She scanned the wreckage, trying to map it to what it once was and where Hawkeye had been. Once she'd pinpointed the most likely location of his body (no, not body, he was _alive_ , he had to be) she began to dig.

She unearthed one of his legs first, and quickly moved up to reveal his head and chest. His eyes were closed, and he was still. Too still. But fingers pressed to his throat found a pulse, and when she leaned close his breath ghosted over her skin.

"Come on, Clint," she murmured, clearing the rest of the rubble that covered him. "Come on. Wake up. We need to get out of here." She knew she shouldn't touch him, shouldn't move him until she was sure there were no spinal injuries or severe head trauma, but they couldn't stay here, not with the attention they'd drawn. "Now is _not_ the time for a nap."

But he didn't stir, and finally Natasha gave up and called for backup and just sat beside him. She stroked the hair at his temple, matted with blood but the gash wasn't serious. "All right," she said. "Хорошо. Отдохни, я за тобой слежу." * 

She listened to him breathe, listened for any signs of difficulty, any indication that he was more injured than he seemed. Minutes ticked by and she was acutely aware of the passage of time as help failed to arrive. It was getting darker and colder, and she hunkered down closer to her partner.

His breath quickened, then choked off and stopped, bringing Natasha instantly alert. "Clint. Clint, don't you dare." She checked his pulse – still strong – and tapped his cheek. "Don't do this."

But still nothing, so she tipped his head back gingerly, pinched his nose... and he coughed and started to breathe. His eyes cracked open and he smiled. "So you would." His voice was hoarse, and he winced when he moved.

Natasha stared at him. "Would what?"

"Give me mouth-to-mouth if I stopped breathing. I wasn't sure." He was smirking, his eyes sparkling even in the dim light, though he was clearly in pain.

Again, it took a moment for her mind to catch up. Natasha's eyes widened, and then her jaw set. "You were _faking_?"

"Well, I held my breath," Clint admitted. "Wanted to see if you'd be the Prince Charming to my Sleeping Beauty." The smirk was a full-fledged grin now, even as Natasha's eyes narrowed and her hands tightened into fists. "Good to know you would."

Natasha gritted her teeth. "Did you really doubt it?"

"No. But you can't blame a guy for trying." He groaned. "Help me up."

She shook her head. "Stay still. You fell pretty far, and hard. We don't know..." Her voice trailed off and Clint's smile faded. 

"Okay," he said. He found her hand and held it tight, resting on his chest. In the distance they could hear a helicopter, and they could only hope it was their backup. Natasha's grip on him tensed as the sound grew louder, then began to fade.

It looped back around , though, and landed. Natasha hunched protectively over Clint, shielding him from the dust that the rotor wash kicked up as best she could until she had to move so they could strap him to a backboard and load him into the chopper to evacuate. She climbed in after him, staying out of the way while the medic looked him over.

"Whaddaya say, doc? Am I gonna live?"

"You'll live, although you may wish you hadn't for the next few days."

Clint turned his head to look at her. "Hear that, Nat? I'm gonna live."

"You'd better," she said, finally cracking the faintest of smiles. "After the stunt you pulled, I want to kill you myself."

**Author's Note:**

> Translation of the Russian: "All right. Rest. I'm watching over you." Many thanks to Bree for correcting what Google Translate provided to me. :-)


End file.
